<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>Bear me away by praycambrian</title>
<style type="text/css">

body { background-color: #ffffff; }
.CI {
text-align:center;
margin-top:0px;
margin-bottom:0px;
padding:0px;
}
.center   {text-align: center;}
.cover    {text-align: center;}
.full     {width: 100%; }
.quarter  {width: 25%; }
.smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
.u        {text-decoration: underline;}
.bold     {font-weight: bold;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25982890">Bear me away</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/praycambrian/pseuds/praycambrian'>praycambrian</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Justified</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Hunger Games Setting, M/M, Quarter Quell (Hunger Games)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-08-19</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-09-02</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 11:40:39</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>4,886</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25982890</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/praycambrian/pseuds/praycambrian</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <em>Raylan’s wearing a suit. Boyd ain’t: just a vest, his grandaddy’s pocket watch on a chain. The day so hot and thick it feels like concrete poured around them. Everyone left to set inside it like fossils.</em>
</p><p>To mark the 50th Hunger Games, four children are reaped from each District. Twelve still wins.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Boyd Crowder/Raylan Givens</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>12</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>53</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Chapter 1</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>See the end notes for more warnings.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Raylan’s wearing a suit. Boyd ain’t: just a vest, his grandaddy’s pocket watch on a chain. The day so hot and thick it feels like concrete poured around them. Everyone left to set inside it like fossils. </p><p>They call Raylan first. The girls are already up there in their ironed dresses. Ava Crowder, fifteen, who lives down the street from Raylan. Ellen May Miller, twelve, already crying. They call Raylan first and Boyd makes a groaning noise like a girder starting to give way under the earth and Raylan doesn’t look at him, he can’t, so he walks up to the stage. The escort beams. Their golden face gleaming with cosmetics, grainy lamplight sparkle. They offer their hand: congratulations. Raylan spits on it. He stands next to Ava. She latches onto his wrist fierce enough to bruise. He thinks: <em> good. </em> </p><p>It’s easy to see Boyd in the crowd: he’s already moving forward, even before the escort pulls his name from the bowl. People part around him. Like he’s in the mines, crawling down a cut, det cord in hand: <em> I make a way in the dark where there is no way.  </em></p><p>His pale scrubbed-clean face. Proud, calm, electric. Young. Everything the cameras could dream.</p><p> </p><p>Helen grabs him by the shoulders. <em> Whatever you need to do, you do it, boy. You hear me? Raylan, you come back</em>. His mama touches Helen’s arm. Helen is crying. His mother is not. She slips off the chain around her neck, the horseshoe ring on it. Each reaping she’s put it on in the morning and only taken it off at night. Those six long afternoons: her boy safe for now, the pendant left hanging on her breastbone for the kid who went to die in his place. Then: into the jewelry box to sleep another year. </p><p>She breaks the chain and takes up his right hand in both of hers, like he’s little again and she’s teaching him to count on his fingers.<em> One, two, three-four-five, once I caught a hare alive. Six, seven, eight-nine-ten, then I let him go again. </em>The ring fits. Already body-warm. He knows it came down from their family, hers and Helen’s. He just doesn’t know how, or who. </p><p>Arlo’s standing by the door. Raylan hugs his mother, his aunt. Arlo stares at him: hellfire scowl, crooked teeth, veins cabled in his neck. <em> You best tear them apart, boy, </em> he growls. <em> Best pretend they’re me. </em></p><p>Raylan shuts the door behind them. </p><p>Down the hall, he can hear Bo Crowder bellowing. He leans his head against the doorframe. <em> How dare you! How dare you! </em> Peacekeepers have to drag the man away. He’s not shouting at them, or the mayor, or the escort, or the gamemakers, or the president himself. He’s shouting at Boyd. Bo gets a cut of every good that comes in or out of Twelve and his boys haven’t needed to take tesserae more than once or twice in their lives. <em> How could you! How dare you! </em> Boyd put his name in thirty-five times. One for each of Raylan’s. He’d promised. <em> If they don’t make the world fair then we’ll just have to do it ourselves. </em> Sunburn peeling off their shoulders. Their feet cool in the green creek. Raylan told him not to. Raylan begged. Boyd, his ruthless justice: <em> If I’ve got to live with the chance of watching you die in the games, then you’ve got to do the same for me. </em> Too broke for gold, they’d wrapped wire round their ring fingers. <em> Together in all things. </em> </p><p>Raylan’s got two rings, now. Two promises. He flattens his hands on the door’s cracking white paint and his hands nearly glow in the sun. </p><p> </p><p>Ellen May’s still crying on the train, silent miserable hiccups she can’t control. Ava cradles her into her lap, singing. <em> I cannot make you no promise, for love is such a delicate thing</em>. Slender hands smoothing over dark Seam hair. <em> Fly away, little pretty bird, for he’d only clip your wings. </em></p><p>Boyd pushes Raylan up against the glass wall of the last car. The hills and woods blurring away behind them. <em> Let it be me</em>, Boyd says. Raylan’s hands seized in his shirt. <em> It has to be me</em>. </p><p><em> It should be me. You got Bowman to look after</em>. </p><p>
  <em> I got you.  </em>
</p><p>Raylan’s face in Boyd’s neck. Nobody to say the dampness there ain’t sweat. The light’s fading. Pink, thin as a tulip petal. He can hear Boyd’s heart pounding. <em> It won’t matter, </em> Raylan says. <em> We’re from Twelve. Ain’t none of us going to make it. Together in all things, right? </em>Meaning: not even death do us part. </p><p>Boyd stag-still. The gears in his mind turning over and over. </p><p>
  <em> What about the girls, Boyd? </em>
</p><p>
  <em> I’ll figure it out. Raylan. Trust me. Raylan. I promise. </em>
</p><p>The escort finds them like that, wrapped up in each other like vines. Raylan’s seen them all his life and still can’t read them, their bright plastic face: maybe a crack of doubt in that smile. Maybe not. </p><p> </p><p>Mags Bennett’s waiting for them. Sprawled on the couch, eyes cold as a snake’s beneath the snakeskin haze of alcohol. </p><p>The escort tsks in disapproval. <em> Really, Mags? It hasn’t been two days. Is there even any left?  </em></p><p><em> Don’t worry, Wynn, </em> she says. <em> There’s more than enough to go around.  </em></p><p>She looks at the four of them: her new tributes. Sparrow-awkward in the lavish rooms. <em> Go on now, tads, </em> she says. <em> Drink up. You’re in the Capitol now.  </em></p><p>Ellen May clutching Ava’s hand. <em> No, thank you,</em> Boyd says calmly. Mags won her games with poison.</p><p>She laughs and laughs. A clean pick of hate in Raylan’s chest, driving out the fear. She can see it. She asks his name and he gives it. </p><p><em> Raylan Givens, huh. </em> He doesn’t understand the way she’s looking at him. <em> I despised your daddy, and I pitied your mama, but I loved your aunt Helen. </em>Past tense: things she used to feel, in a distant world, long ago, for people who don’t exist to her anymore. An invisible wall between them: here and there, now and then, victor and citizen. Mags lost all three sons to the games. She hasn’t set foot in Twelve since.   </p><p>Dinner is more food than they’ve ever seen in their lives. Mute servants like shadows. Mags explains why. Boyd’s hand tight on his fork. Anyone would lose if their tongue’s cut out, but some more than others. Ellen May staring. Ava’s face like a stone.</p><p><em> You gonna help us? </em>Ava says to Mags.  </p><p>Mags takes a long drink of clear liquor. <em> Sure I am, honey. </em> Her smile wax-sliding from her face. <em> As if you were my very own.  </em></p><p> </p><p>They’re given separate rooms, but Raylan doesn’t even bother pretending to stay on his own. <em> We won’t be able to really talk again, </em> Boyd had said on the train. <em> There’s always going to be someone watching from now on. Listening</em>. </p><p>Raylan doesn’t care if the president himself has a theater view of him sweeping half a dozen pillows to the floor so he can slide in on his side of the bed. Boyd looks at him: annoyed, rueful, fond. <em> What does it matter if they know</em>, Raylan says. <em> Anyone who doesn’t is going to find out soon enough. </em> Marriages are public record. Boyd’s already spinning up their story for the cameras, Raylan can tell. If it’s a weakness, they’re already weak. No hiding that. </p><p>Boyd, on the train: <em> I’m gonna have to lie like a snake to keep us alive. Twist people up in their own minds. I won’t be able to tell you what’s real and what ain’t. You have to trust me</em>. </p><p>Raylan, now, in the dark: tracing Boyd’s ring, over and over.</p><p> </p><p>Not one of them scores above a six.</p><p> </p><p>The stylists put Raylan in a white suit. Ivory so finely stitched with crystal he glitters when he breathes. Sharp and diamond-bright. Pale pale pale in the mirror, and then: his soft dark eyes like a deer’s. </p><p>Boyd’s touch gentle, reverent. <em> You’re so beautiful. </em>But his face strains with fury. </p><p><em> What? </em>Raylan says. </p><p><em> You should’ve had this to wear on our wedding day</em>, Boyd says. <em> How dare they think they can look at you like this now. Any of them. How dare they.  </em></p><p>Boyd walks on stage in black so dark it swallows the light, black woven with fiery orange filaments, live wires that singe the cloth and blur him with smoke. His face a grinning mask lit from below. His eyes blazing. Raylan can’t look away. </p><p><em> I don’t know which of us has it worse. </em> Ava’s standing behind him. Dove-gray, gossamer, silver lining her eyes. They looked at her and thought: <em> precious</em>. Raylan looks at her and thinks: <em> steel</em>. </p><p><em> You’re the only one who’s guaranteed an ally in there</em>, she says. <em> But there’s only one victor. Maybe I’m better off alone from the start.  </em></p><p>Ellen May behind her, makeup smudged around her big eyes. Both girls in gray, like sisters. The Twelve tributes: coal, ash, charcoal, diamond. </p><p><em> Ain’t none of us alone, </em>Raylan says.  </p><p> </p><p>The host says <em> So, Boyd, what’s your strategy for winning the Hunger Games?  </em></p><p>Boyd’s hands laced like he’s come round for tea. <em> Well, Quarles, I do have a strategy. But I don’t intend to win. </em></p><p>A titter of uneasy laughter in the audience. The host tilts their head, birdlike. <em> How intriguing! What on earth do you mean?   </em></p><p><em> I mean my husband is going to make it out alive</em>, Boyd says. </p><p>He doesn’t name Raylan. He doesn’t have to. A long murmur like wind through the crowd. Ten thousand sighs of exquisite sympathy. </p><p><em> What awful luck </em> , the host says tearily. Their bright, eerie eyes. <em> Married tributes! That’s never happened before, in the whole storied half-century history of the games! And you’re so young.  </em></p><p>Boyd shrugs. <em> That’s how we survive in Twelve. Die young? Marry young. Why wait when I knew who I wanted, when he wanted me? </em> He leans forward. <em> You know what that’s like, Quarles? </em></p><p><em> To be married? Once or twice, I daresay. </em>The audience laughs. Boyd smiles. </p><p><em>No, </em>he says gently. <em>I mean do you know what it’s like to dig down into the middle of your soul and find the core that won’t give way? No matter how much you fear, or hate, or doubt. No matter that you sometimes wish it would give way after all—crack just a little. Crumble. Because that would be easier. Easier than living with this impossible shining thing inside you. </em>Boyd’s face lit by his flickering costume, his voice dark and steady. A pin-drop silence hanging on his words. <em>I'm a miner. I make a way in the dark when there is no way, and this is how.</em> <em>Do you understand? I don’t mean love, or morality, or conviction, Quarles. I mean something else.</em></p><p><em> And what’s that? </em>the host murmurs when the pause stretches. </p><p>Boyd leans back. The smiling mask in place again. He stole the room right out from under them, and he knows it, and so do they.  </p><p><em> Give me what I need to kill every last child who comes after my husband, </em> Boyd says, <em> and maybe you’ll find out.  </em></p><p> </p><p>The sponsors all want them. Boyd the firebrand, Raylan the beauty. None of them will make it long; still, a good bang for the buck.</p><p>Wynn is beside themselves with pride. Mags pours moonshine in her sweet tea. <em> Keep away from these girls, </em> she says, <em> or I’ll make sure you die out there.  </em></p><p>Raylan shoves his plate away. <em> We ain’t animals. </em> </p><p><em> Not yet</em>. </p><p>Ellen May puts her little hand on Mags. <em> It’s okay, Miss Bennett. We know you’ll be looking out for us.  </em></p><p>Ava watching Boyd, guarded as a hawk.</p><p><em> Eat something</em>, Boyd tells Raylan quietly. Raylan scowls at the coddling. Boyd doesn’t see. He’s watching Ava back. </p><p> </p><p>In the dark, the comforter pulled over them, as close to invisible as they’ll ever be again. Raylan’s hands on Boyd’s ribs. <em> Don’t you dare die for me. Don’t you dare. </em></p><p><em> I promise</em>, Boyd says.  </p><p> </p><p>They’re pulled apart on the roof of the training center. The hovercrafts waiting. Raylan kisses Boyd hard. Boyd kisses him back: mouth, eyelids, forehead.</p><p><em> Trust me, Raylan. </em>He’s trying to stay calm. Somehow that’s worse.</p><p>
  <em> I do.  </em>
</p><p>
  <em> Trust me.  </em>
</p><p>The long flight, land rolling away beneath Raylan like props on a conveyor belt. The arena. The catacombs. They’re only allowed one token. The night before: Boyd leaning back in the vee of Raylan’s legs, clever fingers unwinding the wire of their rings, remaking a single band for his own thumb so Raylan could keep his mama’s horseshoe. <em> I’ll hold onto it for you, honey.  </em></p><p>The tube, rising. A blaze of light. A massive lurid meadow. The countdown. A scent like honeysuckle. </p><p>He can’t see Boyd. </p><p>The gong. </p><p>Raylan runs.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Chapter 2</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>A reminder that, this being a Hunger Games AU, there’s graphic violence, both by and against children, as well as the attendant traumas of surviving a fascist state. See the end notes for more warnings.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>When they find each other the meadow is slick with blood and Raylan’s ears are ringing. He doesn’t recognize Boyd at first, and then he does: his man coalescing out of this brutal daylight like he does from the dark of the mine. It’s the closeness. His face dirt-dark, ash-blurred. One of the tributes stepped off the platform too early. </p><p>Their mouths shake around words without sound. It seems the whole world is shaking, cell to stratosphere. Boyd saved him in a mine collapse, once, just after they got married. A honeymoon gift: the hand clamped on his. The living world bellowing back into their lungs, the two of them crawling back up into the blue air. </p><p>Now it’s Raylan who grabs hold and pulls them from danger. Keeps pulling. </p><p> </p><p>When they can’t run, they walk. Far as they can from the bloodbath. Boyd says wandering is better, to keep the hunters at bay. Raylan trusts his man. <em> I make a way in the dark when there is no way</em>. But they find no darkness in this arena. Just the daylight, unending. Almost buzzing. A million colors in the meadow, in the sky. Before long, each one like a needle in the brain. </p><p>Night-dark only when the sky dims enough to project the faces of the dead. </p><p>Fourteen that first day: a girl from One, both Two boys, a Four boy, a Four girl, the Five girls, a Seven boy, the Eight boys, everyone from Ten. </p><p>Boyd digs his knife into the earth. The sky brightens again. Raylan rolls over and buries his face in the grass but the light still seeps in through his hands, flesh-red. </p><p>Fourteen. </p><p>The girl from Four, savage brightness whisked out of her eyes like a curtain. Behind it: nothing. Boyd with a rock in his hand and blood on his face. <em> Give me what I need to kill every last child. </em>Turns out he didn’t need a thing.</p><p>Twelve’s a place small and dense as a knot. Raylan knew Boyd a long time before they started robbing mines, but he never loved him until the dark. Boyd an odd kind of glass: an old hurricane lamp. On the surface of the earth, from some angles he seemed empty, wind glancing off his Twelve-bare bones. It was down in the black where you could see him best. Prism at every turn. Like he stored up the sunshine just to let it out where it was most needed. A gift. Raylan’s never known how, or why, or what he did to deserve it. </p><p>He uncovers his eyes, rolls to his knees in the acid light. </p><p><em> Lie down</em>, he tells Boyd. <em> I’ll take first watch. It’s all right, darling. Just lie down. </em></p><p>They’re both trembling, exhausted. Boyd again stranded on some bright surface: hollow. Sweat’s made white lace where the blood washed from his face. He’s looking at his hands.</p><p><em> You saw, </em>Boyd says. </p><p><em> Yeah, I saw</em>, Raylan says. <em> You. </em></p><p>The only part of the answer that matters. </p><p> </p><p>The meadow stretches miles and miles. They walk south: away from the mountains, the forest. Something’s turning in Boyd’s mind. Raylan can feel the cameras on them, invisible eyes, attention dense as heat coming off an engine. A low humming. </p><p>Raylan grabs Boyd, pulls him back. <em> Wait.  </em></p><p>
  <em> What?  </em>
</p><p>He’d thought it was his own head pounding, but the air’s shivering. He plucks a long stem of grass and tosses it in front of them. It buckles, sparks, burns out. </p><p>Boyd considers the forcefield for a long moment, head wild dog-cocked. There’s a trick to looking for it: from the corner of the eye, a grainy film over the daylight. </p><p>Raylan keeps watch while Boyd spends a couple minutes digging carefully with a stick. The forcefield extends into the ground. No escape that way. </p><p>Boyd stands. Throws another stem of grass, watches it ash in the air.  </p><p><em> Guess we’re heading for the mountains after all, </em>Raylan says. </p><p>Boyd looks another long moment out into the distant, untouchable hills. </p><p><em> Guess so</em>, he says finally. </p><p> </p><p>The food runs out late in the second day. They’ve been rationing, and they know how to be hungry. But there’s two of them. Nothing comes from nothing. </p><p>Boyd wants to head back to the cornucopia. Raylan wants to take their chances in the forest. If they were home, they’d get ornery, argue, fuck, compromise. Here one of them will lose.</p><p>The grass is so tall they’re invisible sitting. It swallows up sound. Acid-blue dragonflies tremble in the stalks’ feathered heads.</p><p>Boyd remakes their rings. They return the promises to their fingers as solemn as the first time: all Panem as witnesses, now, instead of just the folk of Twelve crammed in their one clapboard hall. </p><p>Raylan puts his mouth to Boyd’s ear to make his whispers look like love-nothings. <em> What’s the real plan? </em></p><p>Boyd shakes his head. </p><p><em> Come on, </em> Raylan whispers. <em> You think I don’t know what you look like when you lie? I saw you on that stage. </em></p><p>
  <em> Every last word of that was true.  </em>
</p><p>
  <em> But it wasn’t more than every fourth word of the whole truth. Was it? Come on. What are you thinking? </em>
</p><p>
  <em> Raylan— </em>
</p><p>The dragonflies are bobbing now. Purposeful. The tops of the grasses waving, though there’s no breeze. </p><p>They crouch, armed. </p><p>A shadow. </p><p>Raylan shifts his hold on his knife. Boyd jerks his head. But it’s Raylan’s turn for bloody hands. <em> Together in all things </em>. He lunges. </p><p>Ava: dirty, fierce. In her hands a wood staff raised. </p><p>They stare at each other. The whites of her eyes. Raylan feels like laughing. Then he does: a fox-shrill wheezing. </p><p><em> Let’s just all turn around, </em> Ava says, hard. <em> It don’t have to be like this.  </em></p><p><em> It ain’t like nothing</em>, Boyd says. He spreads his hands: dinner plate–empty. <em> We promised Mags. We ain’t going to do anything to you.  </em></p><p>
  <em> No way you can prove it I’m going to believe.  </em>
</p><p>Raylan’s been searching the grass behind her. <em> Ava</em>, he says, <em> where’s Ellen May?  </em></p><p>They can tell from her face.</p><p><em> How, </em>Boyd says. </p><p><em> I killed one boy who went for her, but it didn’t matter, </em> Ava says. <em> Everything’s poison. She got thirsty. I didn’t know.  </em></p><p><em> It ain’t your fault, </em>Raylan says. </p><p>Ava stares at them. There’s a deep pit in her mind, now, and they watch her go down it.</p><p><em> Ava, it ain’t your fault, </em>Raylan says again. </p><p><em> Maybe it’s a mercy, </em> Ava says.</p><p>Boyd spits. <em> It’s murder. They murdered her.  </em></p><p>He names the president, snarling. Each of the gamemakers. Quarles, the host. Wynn, the escort. Every Capitoline he knows. Every one he doesn’t. <em> You did this! You murdered that little girl! </em></p><p><em> Boyd—don’t— </em>Ava’s trying to stop him. He’s too loud, shouting. If they’re found they’re all dead. </p><p>Raylan tugs Boyd down flat in the grass, wrestles on top of him, hand on his mouth. Hushing. The shape of their bodies like a stamp. When they move on, the grass will rise like they were never there. </p><p>Boyd’s hot skin. His eyes wet. Raylan dries his face so the cameras won’t see. Tremors in his hands. Not even in the collapse was Boyd like this. Not even for the reaping. </p><p>When Boyd stands again he’s quiet. There’s a pit in him now, too. Or there was before, and now Raylan’s seeing it. Boyd puts his hand on the side of Ava’s face, lets it drop.</p><p><em> We’re going to the cornucopia, </em> Raylan says. <em> Come with us, Ava. </em></p><p>She looks slow in all directions as if a gate might open up in the air and whisk her home. </p><p><em> All right</em>, she says. </p><p> </p><p>They stop a mile from the cornucopia and split the crumbs of Ava’s last protein bar. None of them have had water in days. The time to cut their skin and drink the blood isn’t yet upon them, but it’s loping closer: a wolf over long distance, red tongue lolling. </p><p>The darkened sky. The parade of the day’s dead.</p><p>At the end: Ellen May’s face. Her shy smile, looping.</p><p> </p><p>Hunger wakes Raylan in the bright yellow night. Ava’s on watch. So quiet there’s barely breath in it, candle-flame thin, she’s singing. </p><p>
  <em> Bear me away on the breeze of the morning. Bear me away to my old home far away. Let me sit down, down by the window where my mother used to pray. </em>
</p><p>The sound of it ladders Raylan’s mind down into some sweet darkness. A memory: his own mother’s lap, her hands cool on his feverish face. </p><p><em> Where’d you learn that? </em>he whispers. </p><p>Ava doesn’t startle. He doesn’t think anything can startle her, now. </p><p><em> My mama, </em> she murmurs. <em> And she from her mama, like yours from hers. On and on, back and back. That song’s older than Panem, you know that? </em></p><p><em> That’s treason, </em>Raylan says, only mostly teasing. </p><p>
  <em> So? They’re gonna do worse than kill us anyway. Might as well get some truth out of it.  </em>
</p><p>
  <em> You’re as bad as Boyd.  </em>
</p><p><em> As if you ain’t. </em> She raises her eyebrows. <em> We grew up in the same holler, Raylan Givens. You think I don’t know you? You think I can’t see you want to burn this down just as much as any of us?  </em></p><p>His fists are clenched. He relaxes them.</p><p><em> This ain’t the mine, </em> he says. <em> The rules are different here.  </em></p><p>Ava looks away, back into the searing gold air. <em> Bullshit. It’s the same rules everywhere.  </em></p><p> </p><p>It’s Raylan’s watch when he sees it: a blue blur to the south, at first smaller than a speck swimming in his vision. The grass waving below it. In the span of a blink, it brightens to the size of a pin. Then a penny.</p><p>He shakes Boyd and Ava awake. </p><p>
  <em> Look. Am I hallucinating? </em>
</p><p>
  <em> If you are, then so am I. What is it?  </em>
</p><p>
  <em> Whatever it is, it ain’t good.  </em>
</p><p>They start walking, glances thrown like salt over their shoulders. </p><p><em> It’s moving quick, </em>Ava says grimly. </p><p>Boyd’s head titled: <em> You hear that?  </em></p><p>A faint rattling, like a thousand tin slivers in a heavy wind. Sunlight flashing sharp from the cloud: wings. The blue dragonflies. Easily half a million. </p><p>They start running.</p><p>
  <em> Get out the open!  </em>
</p><p>Raylan’s breath bloody in his throat. Boyd stumbles. Ava hauls him up. The grass that hid them now hinders. They crash into the forest, underbrush lashing. Bare seconds later, a metallic clatter as the scourge hits the trees. </p><p>Ava yelps. Boyd darts down a hill. <em> Hold your breath!  </em></p><p>They fly off an overhang. Half a heartbeat to gulp in air before they hit the water. Cold rush in his ears. Sting of rocks scraping his knees. <em> Everything’s poison. </em>Raylan keeps his eyes closed as long as he can, hands casting out. Boyd. Ava. Boyd. </p><p>He can’t find them. </p><p>The water’s dark with silt, churning. Can’t see nothing, no Boyd, no Ava: just shadows. His lungs seize. His eyes burn. He breaks the surface and gasps, blinking. His vision smeared with a rainbow shimmer, like a hot oil film on his eyes. Half a breath, under again before the dragonflies can rake the skin from his face. Again. Again. </p><p>On the far side of the pond he realizes the roaring in his ears isn’t blood, it’s flame: fire in the woods, insects crackling to earth, their wings made ash. </p><p>A body in the smoke, on the ground. Human. Small.  </p><p>Raylan stumbles dripping onto the bank. Hand over hand through the flames. Dragonflies knifing his shoulders as they fall. He grabs hold of a limb, any limb, hauling backwards until they both tumble into the pond. Heads above water, this time, below the smoke: the thin slip of safe air between poisons. He can hear the dragonflies dying, chiming like bells when they hit the ground.</p><p>
  <em> Raylan!  </em>
</p><p><em> Boyd, </em> he rasps. <em> Boyd.  </em></p><p>The world’s dimmed, wavering. Hot bites of ash on his face. He closes his eyes. Breathes: feels the breath of the stranger slumped against his neck. </p><p>Boyd’s familiar hand on his arm. <em> Raylan. Raylan, look at me.  </em></p><p>
  <em> Can’t.  </em>
</p><p>
  <em> What’s that mean? </em>
</p><p>Raylan opens his eyes: a field of charcoal grays, like Ellen May’s dress. Turns his head. <em> Means I can’t.  </em></p><p><em> Jesus. </em> Boyd hisses, a long sound like the spine being pulled from a snake. <em> Who’s this? </em></p><p><em> Don’t matter, </em> Ava says. <em> We gotta get out of here. I ain’t dying like this.  </em></p><p>Real fear in her voice. Her daddy died in the mine fire a few years back: tunnels sealed, flames sucking up air and bodies alike. Ain’t nothing worse. Least not for a grown person.  </p><p><em> You ain’t dying at all, Ava Randolph</em>, Boyd says. His hand leaves Raylan. The sound of cloth ripping. <em> Wet these. We’ll cover our mouths and crawl.  </em></p><p> </p><p>The kid’s name is Tim. </p><p>He comes to in their little cave refuge quiet as a mouse with a knife in his hand. The last Eleven boy, it turns out. He’s afraid his ally died in the fire they set, though he won’t say it. His child’s voice flat like a beaten penny: copper, blunt. </p><p><em> Why’d you save me</em>, he says. </p><p>Boyd nudges Raylan. He’s already good about it: touching Raylan, keeping him tethered when he opens his eyes and sees nothing but black. </p><p><em> You’re a kid, </em> Raylan says. <em> Why wouldn’t I?  </em></p><p>
  <em> Could stab you in your sleep. Games only have one winner.  </em>
</p><p><em> You here to win, Tim? </em> Boyd says. <em> That why you volunteered?  </em></p><p><em> You volunteered? </em> Ava says. <em> You can’t be more than thirteen!  </em></p><p><em> Twelve</em>, Tim says. Flat. <em> I’m tall for my age </em>. </p><p>Raylan: <em> Kid, we ain’t killing you </em>. </p><p>Boyd: <em> We ain’t killing nobody </em>. </p><p>A long silence. There’s something about the way he said it: heavy, too-true. Raylan weighs it. His eyes open: a coin of brightness that might be the daylight in the mouth of the cave, might be a part of his retina that’ll never see again. It makes him think of home. The mine. The light that means escape. </p><p><em> Tell them the plan, Boyd, </em>Raylan says. </p><p>Boyd’s hand tightens on Raylan’s arm.</p><p><em> What plan? </em>Tim says. </p><p><em> Yeah, Boyd, </em> Ava says. <em> What plan. </em> </p><p>Boyd, slow: <em> I think I can get us all out.  </em></p><p>
  <em> What do you mean, all? </em>
</p><p>
  <em> What do you mean, out?  </em>
</p><p><em> It means he lied to Quarles, </em> Raylan says. Relief like icemelt in his veins: his sly man. <em> He ain’t playing their games. He means there’s a way out. For all of us.  </em></p><p>Boyd runs a hand through Raylan’s drying hair, thumbs his eyelids closed. <em> You sure got my number, huh, boy, </em>he murmurs. </p><p>
  <em> Got more than that. </em>
</p><p><em> Bullshit</em>, Tim says. <em> There’s no way out. Fifty years, no one’s ever broken out of an arena.  </em></p><p><em> Well, you heard what I told them, </em> Boyd says. <em> I make a way where there ain’t no way. That part is true.  </em></p><p>
  <em> How?  </em>
</p><p>
  <em> Too soon to say. Gamemakers hear us, they’ll try to stop us.  </em>
</p><p><em> And once we get out of the arena? </em> Ava demands. <em> Where we gonna go? You think they won’t hunt us down in an hour flat?  </em></p><p><em> Better there than here, </em> Raylan says. <em> Better they kill us than make us killers.  </em></p><p>Ava laughs. She sounds like Mags. <em> Too late for that, honey. </em></p><p><em> Never too late while we’re living, </em> Boyd says. <em> What happens if they can’t make us kill each other? Their games fall apart. And what happens if their games fall apart, with the whole world watching?  </em></p><p><em> You’re crazy</em>, Tim says slowly. <em> You’re talking about another rebellion.  </em></p><p>Boyd holds his arms out, preacher-like. Raylan feels it: the air moving, the shadow. </p><p><em> They’re in my games now, </em> Boyd says. <em> They gave me this, these eyes on me. More fool them for not realizing how I’d use it. </em></p><p>Raylan: <em> Ava? </em></p><p>Ava sighs. <em> Only you, Boyd Crowder. </em> A bead of dark in her voice. <em> All right. I’m in. </em></p><p>Raylan: <em> Tim? </em></p><p><em>You asked me why I volunteered, </em>Tim says. <em>Well, the father I have, my number was up whether they reaped me or not.</em> <em>I got tired of people pretending they couldn’t see it. Figured if I was gonna die, might as well make them watch it happen. </em></p><p>Boyd’s calf warm under Raylan’s tightening grip. Bruises bare seconds from blooming. Boyd touches him: not restraint, not a plea for gentle. Just touch.  </p><p><em> Some of us here know something bout that, </em>Boyd says carefully. </p><p>
  <em> Yeah? </em>
</p><p><em> Yeah</em>, says Raylan quietly. </p><p><em> Okay, </em> Tim says. Then, again, a crack in the middle of that flat voice: <em> Okay.  </em></p><p>Ava leans back. The cave’s small, close as a mineshaft: her side pressing all down Raylan’s side. She smells like mud and metal. </p><p><em> Well, then,</em> she says. <em> Let’s give them all something to watch.  </em></p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>In this chapter: non-graphic offscreen death of a child (named character); mildly graphic onscreen death of a child (unnamed character); mention of child abuse.</p>
        </blockquote><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>There’s less on-screen graphic violence than the books or movies, but there is violence, specifically violence against children committed by both children and adults. Boyd and Raylan are 18 and married; ymmv on what constitutes underage in a fictional dystopia, but there’s no explicit sexual intimacy in this story. As always, please feel free to reach out if you need more info on the warnings.</p></blockquote></div></div>
</body>
</html>